All My Secrets Read Free

beautiful as she moves, entrancing. I’ve never been interested in ballet. I grit my teeth, wondering if Mum and Dad deliberately
avoided cultivating that side of my abilities. Mum doesn’t have an artistic bone in her body. She’s all about practical things like baking and gardening and putting up tents on our
definitely unglamorous camping holidays.
    It’s not fair, what they’ve done to me.
    ‘Evie?’ Mum knocks gently on the door.
    ‘Go away,’ I say.
    I can hear her crying and for a second I feel guilty. Then something inside me twists and breaks. I shouldn’t have to feel guilty. My parents have brought this situation on themselves and
my life with them will never be the same again. In that moment, I make a conscious decision to stop calling them Mum and Dad. From now on they’ll be Janet and Andrew.
    And, when I get my money at the end of August, never mind holidays and clothes . . . I’m going to buy my own place. Cheered up by these thoughts, I go back to my web search. After a few
more minutes, I find a fan site for Irina, complete with background biography, performance dates and memorabilia sales details.
    Excitement grows inside me. I read the biography eagerly. It hadn’t occurred to me before, but maybe I’ve got lots of brothers and sisters, a whole alternative family.
    It’s soon clear that I don’t. Irina was the daughter of elderly parents, both of whom are dead. The biog covers the details I’m already aware of: how Irina left home to study
ballet abroad at the age of twelve, her early successes, her decision to change her first name from Irene, her unplanned pregnancy and the year-long hiatus this brought to her career right up to
her triumphant comeback, followed swiftly by her sudden and tragic death at the age of twenty-one in a hit-and-run accident in Nottingham.
    I’m mentioned at the end of the biog as the baby girl Irina leaves behind, but my name isn’t given. Does the writer not know it? I peer at the note at the bottom: the biog was
written by a Gavin Galloway, Irina’s brother. I turn back to the fan site and do a search. It turns out that this man, Gavin, is not just Irina’s younger brother but also the manager of
her fan club, responsible for the sale of the memorabilia. The site is clearly regularly updated and there’s an email and a postal address in Edinburgh.
    I quickly start an email:
Hi, Gavin
    I stop. What on earth do I say next? It doesn’t sound as if he has any idea about where – or who – I am. How do I break the news that I’m out here, eager to meet him, to
find out more about Irina and her life?
    Mum – Janet – is knocking on the door again, calling my name. She’s still crying.
    My fingers hesitate, then I delete the draft. What I want to say can’t be put in an email. Tomorrow I’m going to take a coach to Edinburgh and go and find my uncle. Even if
he’s not at the address on the website any more, whoever lives there will surely know how to reach him.
    Andrew and Janet might not be prepared to tell me about Irina, but surely my Uncle Gavin will.

Three
    I switch my phone back on as I leave the station in Edinburgh. There are four missed calls from Andrew and five from Janet, plus a stack of texts urging me to ring them and
asking if I’m all right.
    I send a quick message – no ‘x’s – saying that I’m fine. I already left a note on the kitchen table explaining that I’d ‘borrowed’ some money from
Andrew’s wallet ‘which I’ll easily be able to pay back at the end of August’ and was going off to find out more about Irina ‘as you won’t tell me
anything’.
    Under any other circumstances I would feel sorry for them, but how can I right now? They’ve kept the truth from me for years. If I’m making efforts to find out about my own history
now, they’ve only got themselves to blame.
    I do a quick check on my maps app. The address from the website – a flat in Rose Street – isn’t far away. I find the